


Luck in War and Love in Cooking

by WinglessCrows



Series: Through the Eyes of a Cook [33]
Category: One Piece
Genre: Character Study, Cross-Posted on FanFiction.Net
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-07
Updated: 2018-07-07
Packaged: 2019-05-27 07:52:16
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15020051
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/WinglessCrows/pseuds/WinglessCrows
Summary: Sanji was a chef and fighter. His hands were used to cook food for his friends, while his legs were meant to protect them, and if Sanji ever found himself in a position where he had to choose between his hands and his legs, he'd choose cooking in a heartbeat.





	Luck in War and Love in Cooking

Sanji was a chef and fighter. His hands were used to cook food for his friends, while his legs were meant to protect them, and if Sanji ever found himself in a position where he had to choose between his hands and his legs, he'd choose cooking in a heartbeat. He loved the thrill of fighting, and he loved having the power to protect what he cared about, but fighting could never in a million years replicate the joy that went with feeding a hungry person, and having them say that it was the best meal they had ever had. There was simply nothing like it, which was why Sanji treasure his hands like Luffy treasured his hat. Yet it hadn't always been like this. When Sanji had first met Zeff he had grabbed a kitchen knife and used that to threaten the pirate and defend himself with, something Sanji would never be able to do now. When they had opened their restaurant and the first few fights had broken out, Sanji had fought with whatever he could get his hands on. As Zeff realized that a floating restaurant was bound to have more rogues and criminals than your average restaurant he took it upon himself to teach Sanji how to fight like a chef. Rule number one: Never use your hands. At first this rule had puzzled young Sanji, because fighting and cooking were different, and in the end they fought to protect the restaurant, so why not do it with your hands. Sanji was especially dissatisfied because when it came down to it, Sanji knew how to kick, but relying solely on kicks was hard, and he had always been taught to use every part of his body to the best of their potential. There was always a situation where Sanji would have preferred to deal a good punch to the face, or take one of his sharp tools to block swords, or maybe even get a good slice in, but Zeff always looked so disappointed whenever Sanji tried something with his hands, and coming from a place where a disappointed look always ended up in something that Sanji would rather avoid, Sanji quickly learned the way of the kicks.

Now, as an adult, Sanji understood why he must never use his hands. There were the simple practical reasons as he couldn't very well cook if he were to break his arm or get a hand chopped off, and with the amount of times Luffy had blood coming from his hands, Sanji knew that he should definitely stick to kicking unless he wanted to serve his friends blood after a fight. However, the main purpose of never using his hands came from something else, something more important. It was the same reason that Zoro held for never getting a cut on the back, and the reason why Brook would fulfil a promise even after his death. It wasn't only a simple matter of pride, principle or even honour. It was what defined them as a person.  _A cut on the back is a swordsman's shame,_ something Zoro had once said and, even though the damn marimo annoyed the ever living crap out of Sanji, it was something that he would always remember. For Sanji a cut on the back was no worry, but a stain on his hands, now that was shameful to a chef.

So Sanji developed his fighting with his legs and through travelling with the strawhats and encountering stronger and stronger enemies, Sanji improved tremendously. Sanji had been relatively strong back on the Baratie, but compared to where he was today, he had been nothing but an ant in a pride of lions. It wasn't a simple matter of only gaining more physical power, but he also acquired certain techniques which helped him gain the advantage in a tricky fight. The ability to literally set his legs on fire was Sanji's big breakthrough, and from that moment it had only gone up. He had learned how to direct the fire from his legs as a form of long distance fighting, and he had figured out how to walk on air without the use of a gimmick or even a devil fruit. Everything he did, he did solely with his legs and where before he would always use his arms as support, he found that nowadays, he'd use them only for balance and gestures that would piss off his opponents.

He improved in cooking too. Every island they visited that had their own special cuisine and Sanji always insisted on staying on civilized islands until he explored their menus to the fullest, something which Luffy thankfully always backed up around meaning that Sanji always got his way. At first it was all about taste and a varied diet to support basic needs, but after Luffy and the others looked more and more worn out after each fight, and Sanji could feel his own body aching a long time after, he felt obligated to help Chopper with the recovery process by providing food that not only supported the body, but actually helped it and improved self-recovery. Zoro had been Sanji's ultimate guinea pig for this, even if the swordsman never knew, but the perfect way to check if a new recipe did the job Sanji wanted it to do was to serve it to the block head who used most of his time training in the crow's nest. Sanji is a little ashamed to admit that he once gave Zoro a stomach ache due to some minor miscalculations combined with a slightly weird idea, and blamed it on the fact that Zoro had been sleeping on deck on a cold day. In the end he had made it up to him by serving him his favorite meal the following day, and it wasn't like Zoro had been seriously ill or anything, so it was all fine.

And with all that Sanji had been improving, Sanji was still not prepared for the New World. The crew had come to the conclusion that Sanji had had the worst luck when it came to literally anything ever since their reunion. At first he had had his little... big problem with seeing women, which had not only resulted in him being dangerously low on blood a couple of times, but also meant that the first meal they shared had not been prepared by him, but by whoever Luffy had stayed with for two years. Upon entering the New World they had come upon Punk Hazard where Sanji ended up getting drugged and kidnapped all while wasting food in the process. And while he had no problems taking out the underlings of Caesar he did have trouble when he encountered Vergo who was not only a Haki master, but also a person whom it had taken the team-up of a Shichibukai and a Vice-admiral to beat. The only good thing that had come from this was that before leaving the island Sanji had gotten to serve one of his new dishes to not only his crew mates, but also a bunch of hungry soldiers (he refused to call them marines as they had been great allies in their struggle), who all liked the food. Then came Dressrosa, and oh boy, Sanji was strong, but facing Doflamingo was a little out of his league, and Sanji had known that from the moment he had taken him on.

All in all, Sanji wasn't really what you would call a lucky guy, and even after all of these horrible, unlucky happenings, his luck just didn't seem to turn. When they first arrive on Zou Sanji is only accompanied by Nami, Chopper and Brook (and Momo and Caesar, but Sanji doesn't really care too much about them), but after having escaped Big Mom they don't really expect to run into the crew mates of another Yonkou, but maybe that was naïve thinking? After all the first person they see is without a doubt a Kaido lackey, and while they had planned on taking on Kaido with Law, this  _had_ to be a coincidence. But meeting Kaido's subordinates on the back of an elephant comes with more problems than what you would expect and when a sudden flood comes along they all get separated, and even though Sanji is still on the same island as the other three strawhats, he is getting seriously tired of always being apart. And in his frustration Sanji makes a mistake, forgets where he is and underestimates his opponent, which, according to himself, is the worst thing you can possibly do in a battle. When Sanji's leg charges against the Haki-clad club he can hear the crackling of his bones, and bites his lip to keep in a scream. The sudden pain is a weird relief though as it makes his senses oddly focused and clears up his cloudy mind, and without taking any more damaged from the stupid lackey with his stupid club he finishes the fight. It takes Sanji a little too long to get to Chopper with the pain in his legs, but what he could he do when they found that the entire population of Zou was literally dying due to a gas weapon made by a person they were currently holding hostage. So Sanji let Chopper (and Caesar) cure the minks before letting himself get treated and got around by leaning on and hopping around on his uninjured leg (except in the presence of Chopper where he would just endure the pain as well as he could). Needlessly to say, Chopper was extremely angry when Sanji came to him twenty four hours after the injury had been dealt, and had he not been the doctor Sanji suspected that he would have left the doctor's designated quarters with more than an injured leg.

His bad luck continues when he one day takes a stroll through the forest to gather some food and encounters another one of Kaido's subordinates who somehow didn't get to escape with the rest of them. This time Sanji didn't have the adrenaline to fight through the pain of his leg injury, so while he was probably much stronger than this weird looking person with horns, the fact that he literally couldn't use his legs was a big disadvantage. He needed both his legs for Blue Walk, so he had no way of getting into the air quickly, if he was fighting on ground he need one leg to stand and one to kick with, so this situation was just great. He didn't want to run away either, mostly because of pride, but in reality how far would he get with an injured leg? Probably not very far. Sanji tries to bluff and intimidate his opponent instead, but it seems that the guy is bewildered and not on his right mind and attacks when Sanji least expects it, and with his legs out of commission and a sword gunning for his neck, Sanji lifts his arms to defend himself. The sword isn't sharp and Sanji has seen both Zoro and Luffy stop a sword by placing their palms on either side of it, and when Sanji feels steel in his palms and no pain he figures that he succeeded... and then the pain sets in, and instinctively Sanji uses his good leg to kick to guy unconscious, but as a result collapses as his injured leg couldn't support him all that well. Sanji is no longer touching the sword, but the pain is still there and  _damn_  in hurts. One would think that fire and heat wouldn't be a problem for Sanji, but it most definitely is and he had not expected the sword to be flammable. At this point it had been more than ten years since Sanji had ever had as much a blister on one of his hands and now both of them were covered in burn marks. For once in his life, Sanji ignores the fallen fruits he had gathered before encountering this enemy and makes his way back to his friends as fast as his injured leg allows him.

Luckily for Sanji, Chopper has acquired a special remedy for burns and it only takes Sanji a day to heal, but Sanji uses the day to think long and hard about what had happened. If he kept getting messed up every time they encountered an enemy Sanji would end up becoming nothing more than a burden. Sure, he was still valuable as a cook, but if his hands had gotten injured once by a mere no-name enemy it could surely happen again. Sanji silently decides to get his act together and just when he feels like he has overcome some internal battle, Capone shows up and everything goes right back down the shitter.


End file.
